Hudson Chronicles

I'd been looking for this poster for some time. It was the first concert I'd ever attended. It was around Easter 1967. I was thirteen years old and had a crush on Margie, my older sister's girlfriend. She was fourteen, but might as well have been forty; I certainly wasn't going to get anywhere with her. She had much higher aspirations.

My sister and Margie spent the entire show being pissed off and ignoring me. I was only there because I had a thing for Margie and I begged my mother to have them take me. So there I was.

The show took place at an old RKO movie theater in NYC. Some memories I have of the show are Simon and Garfunkle seeming out of place in matching suits; the Who trashing their equiptment, and Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels getting down and dirty. The girls went nuts over him. Mitch was the main reason everyone came to the show. He had a big hit that year with Devil with the Blue Dress On. I recall the crowd going wild when Mitch Ryder went into a James Brown dropping-to-his-knees frenzy that had everoyone screaming and on their feet. It was something else. I only wish I could remember more. But it's enough for now.

Me and Mrs. Chronicles
The Tappan Zee bridge spanning the beautiful Hudson river.
Tarrytown, NY

One Big Bumpy Day

Did you ever have a bumpy day?
A day when things get in your way
Like tables, chairs and swinging doors
And baby brothers on the floor

Bumped my head
And counted to ten
My eyes saw stars
And a cross-eyed hen

Stubbed my toe
On my dog Tiny
It hurt so much
It made me whiney

Caught my finger
In a kitchen drawer
Cried so loud
My throat got sore

Slipped and fell
On our front lawn
Sank so low
I saw two frogs yawn

Bruised my nose
On a garden hose
It turned so red
I went straight to bed

Did you ever have a bumpy day like that?
A day when things got in your way
Like tables, chairs and swinging doors
And baby brothers on the floor

This Chair

One red chair
Made not too loose
Made to withstand me
And my muse

This chair is a comfort
This chair treats me right
When I sneak up on it
And sing in the night

This chair is inanimate
But moves in my room
This chair is a comfort
When I’m in my gloom

I sit and strum Dylan
Or Guthrie and Waits
I sit and strum loudly
Till the dogs I awake

1. One book that changed your life?
It would would have to be The Pickwick Papers by Dickens. I thought it was the funniest thing I'd ever read. I was in my late teens at the time. Comedy always moved me more than drama. It's when I read this that I knew I wanted to write humor.

2. One book you have read more than once?
I've read The adventures of Huckleberry Finn about four times. Again for the humor and it's eye opening take on racism in America, but set in a country closer to my heart.

3. One book you would want on a desert island?
Little Big Man by Thomas Berger. He painted an American landscape like no other. The American west at its best and worst. It's also very funny. (I've already got Huck Finn so etched in my psyche that it wouldn't have to be my desert island book.)

4. One book that made you cry?
I cried at parts of The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold. So well written about a horrible subject matter: the rape and murder of a child. I'm almost sorry I read it.

5. One book that made you laugh?
My favorite 'funny' book is Naked by David Sedaris. Especially the tale about working as one of Santa's elves at Macy's department store. A worn out phrase: but it's laugh out loud funny.

6. One book you wish had been written?
Mr. Spaceman by Robert Olen Butler. It's a great satire on science fiction novels. One of the most original books I've read.

7. One book you wish had never been written?
The Bible. There I've said it. I've read it, and I still read it on occasion. I love the life of Christ. But I've just had it up to here with the old testement and religion in general. I'm a good and loving person and if there's a heaven that's where I'm going. And no priest, rabbi or televangelist is going to tell me otherwise. So there, lol. (Maybe it's Charlton Heston I'm having the problem with.)

8. One book you are currently reading?
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. I find it helps me cope after I've read the bible. lol.

9. One book you have been meaning to read?
Dante's Inferno (I still plan on going to heaven, though.)